


Ours is a Sacred Duty

by Azzandra, CredibilityProblem



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, Illustrated, Pale Romance | Moirallegiance, Religious Content, Taboo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-25
Updated: 2013-08-25
Packaged: 2017-12-24 15:33:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,827
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/941604
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Azzandra/pseuds/Azzandra, https://archiveofourown.org/users/CredibilityProblem/pseuds/CredibilityProblem
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They come to you one night, together, your past and your legacy hand in hand.</p>
<p>--</p>
<p>Written for HSWC Main Round 3. The theme was "Taboo".</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ours is a Sacred Duty

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Homestuck Shipping World Cup, Main Round 3. Text by Azzandra, illustrations by CredibilityProblem. Thanks to the rest of Team Jokerkind for feedback and suggestions.
> 
> Special thanks also to the people who commented and voted for us.

It takes a long time to make amends after you return. That you have the opportunity at all is only due to the Chief Attendant to the Mother Grub, the very woman you disgraced by running away. She spoke so fervently in your defense at the trial that you know she is the only reason you were not sold off into slavery for your perceived crimes.  
  
You do not have the strength to run away again, so you return to the duties you were meant for, and think of nothing else for long sweeps. You work hard; people forgive. Maybe they forget. After a harsh mating cycle in which you spend countless long days with two ailing mother grubs, you even come back to your quarters to find a cup of tea waiting for you.  
  
The Chief Attendant grows old and hunched and eventually dies. By the time that happens, you are surprised to discover that you are most qualified for her position, but you slip into it without question.  
  
As Chief Attendant, you make your own schedule, as well as everybody else's, and you make sure that your workload does not appear lighter than anybody else's. You take up shifts wherever there's a gap to be filled, and it's on a late day culling shift, working alone, that you come across a bright red-bodied grub.  
  
You pick it up, your hands shaking, cradling it to your chest with an ease you'd thought long since lost, and it opens its eyes to look at you.  
  
It occurs to you that you could run away again.  
  
But you are old, and tired, and your rebellions have become small gestures of nostalgia over the years. And it would not be fair to place the burdens of the Signless on this grub who might not otherwise choose them once it is grown.  
  
You take the coward's route. You cannot save this grub and your heart would not bear to kill it, so you push it through the hatch that leads to the trial caverns, just as if it were a normal grub. Its life or death are no longer your responsibility.  
  
*  
  
It's a scant few sweeps later that your impulsive decision reveals its consequences. They come to you one night, together, your past and your legacy hand in hand.  
  
*  
  
“We have a nice batch this sweep,” Adjuncta tells you as she tries to hand you the list of new jadebloods. She's strangely giddy, but you wave her off; you never look at the list until you've seen the new apprentices in person.  
  
About a dozen young jadebloods are gathered in the antechamber. It's more than you usually get. When they notice you and Adjuncta, they jump up from resting on the ground or leaning against walls and instinctively sort themselves in a line for your inspection.  
  
They always look younger to you every sweep, even though the Condesce hasn't lowered the age of conscription in centuries. Juveniles in the worst stages of adolescent awkwardness regard you with gray eyes.  
  
“The list,” you say, and Adjuncta presents her clipboard with all the requisite ceremony.  
  
You look over the younglings. Some look back at you with curiosity. Others look right ahead. One is looking at the ground, as if hiding behind hair will prevent you from seeing--  
  
Your heart leaps to your throat.  
  
It's his face. You thought you'd forgotten his face, because you could no longer recall it perfectly every morning as you tried going to sleep, but you could never mistake it, not when you see it here, before you: Kankri, eight sweeps old, the day before he jumped up on a crate and started preaching to the masses.  
  
“I knew you'd notice,” Adjuncta whispers in your ear, and you startle. “It's why I wanted you to read the list first. Kanaya Maryam.”  
  
You look down at the list, and your mind is in such a roil, that you almost don't understand what you're looking at. You follow Adjuncta's gaze, and that's when you see her. Kanaya Maryam, with the ghost from your past clinging to her arm.  
  
It's no surprise Adjuncta thought you'd noticed her instead. They stand so close, it looks like they're trying to inhabit the same skin. And Kanaya's appearance would be enough of a shock on any other night. She wears the same face as you, or at least the same face you  _used_  to wear.  
  
  
  
“I think the little one is her moirail,” Adjuncta continues in a whisper.  
  
You look at the list again.  
  
“Please raise your hand as I call out your name,” you say, your voice sounding a bit harsher than you intend. At least it isn't trembling.  
  
He raises his hand when you get to Karkat Vantas, and he tries to appear unafraid. You make eye contact for a brief, harrowing second, and then you look back down to call out the next name.  
  
You try not to pay excessive attention to them as they file out of the antechamber.  
  
You go back to your room and sit down at your sewing machine. You stare at a wall for a while, mind completely blank.  
  
*  
  
You find out through the grapevine that even though Karkat and Kanaya were assigned to different dorms, they somehow managed to finagle themselves into neighboring recuperacoons. You dig for a bit more detail (which means you just make a non-committal noise and Adjuncta continues her prattling) and discover that Karkat was the one responsible.  
  
“Wardeine told me he auspisticized two of the other apprentices,” Adjuncta explains cheerily, “and managed to make them believe that switching recuperacoons was their idea. Your Descendant is very lucky to have him as moirail.”  
  
“When do we have them scheduled for the face to face?” you ask.  
  
“Oh, tonight, both of them. One after the other. I know we usually take these things alphabetically, but we do sometimes make exceptions for moirails and--”  
  
“That's fine.”  
  
Adjuncta doesn't question your curtness.  
  
Whenever you get new jadebloods in, it is the Chief Attendant's job to have a meeting with them, explain what their future in service of the Mother Grub entails and, unofficially, encourage them.  
  
Karkat and Kanaya are the very last ones you see. Adjuncta probably thought you might want more time with them.  
  
Kanaya is easy enough to deal with. Her wide-eyed admiration is flattering, and reminds you of the time when you too were a callow wriggler. She didn't expect to meet her Ancestor any more than you expected to meet a Descendant.  
  
“But you understand that I'll have to be harder on you than the others?” you tell her, and she nods.  
  
“I understand,” she says. “I don't think any appearance of favoritism would benefit me either. If anything, it might just foster resentment. Karkat pointed that out to me. Karkat is--”  
  
“Your moirail. Yes, I know.” She nods again. “It must be serendipity.”  
  
She looks at you, hesitating. Her face goes through several transparent spasms of guilt, but just as you're certain she's about to confess to everything, she takes a deep breath and calms down.  
  
“Yes, it must be,” she says.  
  
Karkat is next. When he sits down in the chair before your desk, something in the way he moves brings you right back to Kankri's wrigglerhood. You have to shake your head to clear away the afterimage. Karkat doesn't notice, fortunately.  
  
You clasp your hands together and lean forward.  
  
“So,” you say in a voice so stern, he immediately takes notice, “who came up with this idea? Was it you, or Kanaya?”  
  
There's a brief moment when his eyes widen to the size of saucers and the rest of him freezes in place.  
  
“I did,” he says quickly. “It was all my idea, Kanaya didn't even-- she doesn't even know that I'm not-- uh.” He stops for a second. “What. What idea are you talking about exactly?”  
  
You give him points for stopping before revealing everything.  
  
“The idea to pass you off as a jadeblood,” you specify.  
  
“I did that! It was all me!” he bursts again. “Kanaya doesn't know I'm not a jadeblood, I tricked her! I tricked her so she'd be my moirail!”   
  
You sigh.  
  
“You are a terrible liar, young man,” you tell him.  
  
His face scrunches up as if in pain.  
  
“No, I'm fucking not! I'm a fantastic liar! I'm the fucking troll Picasso of lies!” he says, his voice turning shrill with desperation.  
  
“Calm yourself, Kanaya's not in trouble,” you say.  
  
He closes his mouth and slumps back in his seat, all the fight drained out of him.  
  
“So what are you going to do with me?” he asks, already resigned.  
  
You honestly don't know.  
  
“Why are you even here, Karkat? What made you think this was a good idea?” you ask him instead.  
  
“My hive was razed,” he admits after a short pause. “I had nowhere to go, and I can't leave the planet because the only way to do that is on an Imperial ship, and the only way on an Imperial ship would be if I was conscripted, and that's... not possible for me.”  
  
“So Kanaya decided to take you with her, as she was not leaving the planet at all,” you surmise.  
  
“No,” he says. “I decided that. It was all my idea. I forced her to go along with it.”  
  
You severely doubt that. The same troll so desperate now to take all the blame and punishment would not have been the same to suggest a course of action which would endanger his moirail. You let it slide for now.  
  
But the question still stands. What are you going to do with him?  
  
Certainly not keep him.  
  
You recall the old Chief Attendant and what she did for you. If anybody ever found out that you let him profane the Mother Grub with an outsider's presence, you would probably be strung up as a traitor the same way you weren't all those sweeps ago.  
  
You stare at the fake jade sign on his shirt. You have some time before his eyes fill in.  
  
“I will help you get off planet,” you say before you can stop yourself.  
  
He straightens up, looks at you in disbelief.  
  
“But-- And Kanaya?”  
  
“You cannot take her with you,” you say. “That's my condition. You go alone. Don't condemn her to the same life as you.” Don't condemn her to the same life I had, you would have wanted to say.  
  
“She won't agree to this,” he says.  
  
“Then lie to her. That's your duty, to lie for the good of your moirail. Don't you know? It's in all the great romances.”  
  
He looks devastated, but he agrees.  
  
*  
  
Kanaya takes to her lessons better than you ever did. You take all the more pride in this because you also know about her secret rebellion right under everyone's noses. And her secret rebellion takes to the lessons just as well, which surprises you.  
  
Karkat is one of only two males in this age group, but despite being an oddity, he still integrates quickly.  
  
You're surprised by how many opportunities you get to inconspicuously check up on them. You think Adjuncta has everybody conspiring to get you to cross paths with your Descendant as many times as possible in a night.  
  
Wardeine, in charge of the dormitories, insists you come to her for her report, and Sophista, the theoretical instructor, invites you to sit in on her classes.  
  
You also see them when you go down to the mother grubs' caverns. You walk in one day to see Wormport teaching the apprentices how to be as gentle as he is with the mother grubs.  
  
Karkat and Kanaya are shoulder to shoulder, easing the passage of brand new eggs, him with a scowl of concentration and she with a serene attentiveness you can't remember ever possessing. They exchange no words and their hands work together in perfect tandem. Wormport nods in approval; not at them, as they are looking down and facing away, but at you.  
  
You nod back. Wormport turns to the apprentices and starts to lecture.  
  
“S'all about respect,” he says. “We carry the Mother Grub's jade in our veins. Means we're the only ones worthy of touching Her daughters, and that comes with responsibilities.”  
  
You go back to your office and send a few messages off-planet.  
  
*  
  
You are in the doorway when Sophista begins her lecture for the night.  
  
“Ours is a sacred duty,” she says, “one only we are able to perform.”  
  
You reflexively look at Karkat, whose face is completely blank.  
  
It's Kanaya's hand that goes up.  
  
“Why?” Kanaya asks.  
  
Sophista blinks, confused.  
  
“Why what?” she replies.  
  
“Why only us?” Kanaya continues. “It seems to me that one only needs hands, eyes and a strong work ethic to perform these tasks. What does blood caste have to do with it?”  
  
The silence falls sharp and deep.  
  
“If blood caste had nothing to do with it,” Sophista says, “then we wouldn't be the only ones able to attend to the mother grubs.”  
  
Kanaya's face screws up in confusion at this circular reasoning, but several of the other apprentices are nodding, as if in understanding.  
  
“But if other castes aren't given the opportunity to try, how do you know they're not able?” Kanaya persists.  
  
“Obviously, if they were able, they would already have been gifted the Mother Grub's jadeblood,” Sophista says, smiling indulgently. She changes the subject after that.  
  
You can see, from this angle, that Karkat has caught Kanaya's hand in his and he squeezes it, shaking his head slightly.  
  
When you get back to your office, you find a reply to one of your messages. It isn't signed, but it is stamped with the Irons. They thank you profusely for finding the Second Coming for them and promise they can get him off Alternia safely. You ignore the stab of pain that sends through you. There is no safety for Karkat on this path you're forcing him to take.  
  
  
  
*  
  
The apprentices get their robes about a perigee into their training. Kanaya looks like she was poured into them, but she tugs at her sleeves self-consciously, still adjusting. Karkat looks uncomfortable at first, and he grumbles about how impractical they are, but mostly he gets a pained look on his face which might be indigestion, but you suspect is actually guilt.  
  
You manage to corner him one night before dawn, as he walks alone back to the dorms, and whisper to him, “Three perigees from now. I've secured passage for you.”  
  
“Thanks,” he whispers back.  
  
“ _Just_  you.”  
  
“I know,” he snaps, and leaves.  
  
*  
  
You turn a corner one night, very early in the evening. You think you're sleepy and imagining the two shapes hiding in a cranny of the corridor, until you approach and see that they're Karkat and Kanaya. It isn't unusual for moirails to sneak a cuddle and a feelings jam before the work night starts, but they speak in harsh whispers.  
  
The conversation cuts off suddenly when they hear your footsteps, and Kanaya storms off in the opposite direction.  
  
Karkat stays behind and looks at you with hurt eyes.  
  
“I'm still lying to her,” he tells you, and he doesn't beg you to let him tell her the truth, but he clearly wants to.  
  
“Two and a half perigees,” you say, and keep walking.  
  
You're not sure which one of you hurts more.  
  
*  
  
“That Vantas kid,” Wormport says one day, as you wait in line at the canteen, “he's twitchy, but he works three times harder than the next apprentice, and Maryam's the only one who can keep up with him.”  
  
“I wasn't aware he was that talented,” you say, picking up a tray.  
  
Wormport snorts.  
  
“Oh  _hell_  no,” he says. “Kid's got so little talent you'd think he wasn't jade. When he got here, he couldn't tell which end of a mother grub was which. Almost got his hand chewed off. But he worked harder than I ever seen an apprentice work to catch up.”  
  
“Hm,” is your only reply.  
  
“Your Descendant's very lucky to have that brat in her quadrants,” Wormport says after a long pause.  
  
“So people keep telling me.”  
  
Two perigees.  
  
*  
  
When you look into the dorms, the newest apprentices are sitting on the floor in in front of Wardeine. She is teaching them the old words, the old oaths all attendants took in ancient times.  
  
“Nobody has ever heard these words who isn't jadeblood,” Wardeine says. “They are ours. Learn them, because when the time comes, you will speak them to the Mother Grub and pledge your life to Her service.”  
  
  
  
Wardeine makes a warding sign towards the engraving of the Mother Grub on the wall behind the apprentices. You feel, for the first time, a stir of guilt; that you allowed these caverns to be sullied. Not for the sake of this idolized figure they call the Mother Grub, but for the sake of people like Wardeine, who believe so deeply in it and trust that you share in that.  
  
Karkat and Kanaya look wan and wide-eyed. Perhaps they think themselves to be blasphemers. You would probably the same, had you not seen first hand the truth of what lies behind holiness.  
  
One and a half perigees.  
  
*  
  
Adjuncta informs you of an appointment.  
  
“It's your Descendant,” she says.  
  
Kanaya takes a seat in the chair before your desk and smooths down her robes, and then sits quietly for a few long seconds, just gathering her thoughts.  
  
“It occurred to me to wonder, just now, if Ancestors have any special responsibilities towards their Descendants,” she says.  
  
“Some choose to take such responsibilities upon themselves,” you reply, voice harsh once you realize what she intends. “But Descendants should think very carefully before they ask for anything.”  
  
She pales slightly.  
  
“Of course. I'm sorry, I think I've made a mistake,” she says, and rises to her feet.  
  
One perigee.  
  
*  
  
The next time you see Karkat, it's when you're both passing through the same corridor, and he is wearing a pair of sunglasses.  
  
“He got those as a wriggling gift from his moirail,” Adjuncta giddily shares with you when she sees you do a double take.  
  
“You are showing entirely too much interest in the new apprentices, Adjuncta,” you reprimand her softly. Adjuncta shrugs.  
  
Half a perigee.  
  
*  
  
Sophista takes them to see the old mural in the disused inner caverns.  
  
She raises her lantern so the old cave paintings can be seen clear.  
  
“No eyes other than ours have ever seen these paintings,” she says in a whisper.  
  
The rotund bodies of mother grubs are painted in jade pigment. You've always wondered if it's blood. Nobody can remember how to make that vibrant jade paint anymore.  
  
“Since the first attendants painted them,” Sophista continued, “no other bloodcaste has been allowed to look upon them.”  
  
You look at Karkat and he is looking down. His fingers are twined with Kanaya's.  
  
 _They would have culled you as a grub_ , you want to tell him.  _They might still kill you if they found out. Why do you still let them forbid you anything?_  
  
But you think that Kankri, in his position, would have done the same, and it cuts right through you, that knowledge.  
  
One week.  
  
*  
  
Wormport enters your office without knocking. He's shaking and furious. A pair of sunglasses, one lens cracked, is clenched in his fist.  
  
“Something's happened.”  
  
Two nights.  
  
You failed him by just two nights.  
  
*  
  
You walk into a room full of scared trolls, shuffling their feet and avoiding eye contact.  
  
“He was helping unload the new supplies,” Wormport explains. “He forgot about the steps off the platform and fell. Coulda poked his eye out on the corner of a crate.” He raises the glasses. “Bleeding gash on his forehead. Musta been a dozen trolls that saw it. Red blood.”  
  
“ _Bright_  red,” Sophista says, shaking her head.  
  
The room lapses in silence.  
  
“For thousands of sweeps we have been the keepers of these halls,” Wardeine says, her whisper loud in the quiet room. “Thousands of years, uninterrupted, we have guarded against such a thing happening. We denied entry to raiders, to warlords,  _to the Empress_ , and it is all for nothing. How could we fail so utterly?”  
  
“We grew complacent,” Sophista says, shaking her head. “We allowed ourselves to be ruled by assumptions.”  
  
Wormport rubs his eyes.  
  
“What do we do?” he asks. “What do we do now? Is there anything?”  
  
“The taint of his blood will mark these halls forever,” Wardeine intones grimly.  
  
“The mother grubs didn't reject him,” you point out.  
  
“Yes, of course, Dolorosa is right,” Sophista says. “His deceit runs deeper than we could have thought possible. We couldn't have been expected to anticipate such a turn of events!”  
  
“No, you're wrong. The Mother Grub tested us and we failed,” Wardeine says.  
  
“Nothing's gonna wash this taint now,” Wormport says, examining the broken shades in his hand.  
  
“Karkat did not do anything to taint the caverns,” you say softly. “The slurry continues to be produced on schedule. The mother grubs are in excellent health. His work ethic was exemplary.”  
  
They look at you strangely.  
  
“We understand you might feel the need to defend him because he's your descendant's moirail,” Sophista says. “But we cannot overlook his transgression. A heinous thing happened today. You must realize the gravity of the situation as well.”  
  
You experience a strange sort of deja vu. Hands reaching out of a crowd to touch Kankri's robe, gently, reverently, as if receiving a blessing.  
  
“Of course,” you say, your voice hollow. “However, I am clearly biased. I should remove myself from this discussion.”  
  
Nobody says a word as you leave the room.  
  
You know what you must do.  
  
*  
  
It takes no time at all to discover where Karkat and Kanaya are. A gaggle of middle-ranking attendants were there to witness when Wormport shoved Karkat in a storage room to hide the sight of his blood from others. It was already too late, but Wormport still barricaded the room and told them not to touch or look at  _it_. Kanaya, having come in search of her moirail, was escorted to the dorms on Wormport's command, where she remains locked even now.  
  
Everybody shares this information with you freely; why would they not? They're too young to remember the indiscretions of your youth, and the full story of what exactly you were doing outside the caverns is something only the Chief Attendant was ever privy to.  
  
You are the Chief Attendant now. They expect you to do something about this.  
  
They do not expect what you  _actually_  plan to do.  
  
*  
  
Kanaya looks at you terrified, a tube of lipstick clenched in her hand.  
  
You take out your master key and a piece of paper inscribed with coordinates and a time two nights from now.  
  
And then you utter the words that bring your life full circle.  
  
“Take him and run.”


End file.
